Shioda is rumored to have had some instruction outside of Ueshiba in Daito ryu...I cannot say how much, and this is often debated. But it should be noted that his licenses from Ueshiba were in Daito ryu, and that Daito ryu and the Kobukan dojo, are said to have invested heavily in this kind of internal skill set. Hard physical training does not contradict the internal training.

I didn't assume there was a contradiction between the two, Ron. I'm just trying to find a door into learning the baseline skill set that I can walk through. Mikes answer seems to be that his version of internal power requires direct hands on contact and is strongly rooted in the Chinese arts, in ways that cant (or shouldnt?) be conveyed on this forum. So my next question is: is there another way in? Can I buy the DVDs of, say, Tetsuzan Kuroda and get ideas? Does some branch of Yoshinkan (Chida, perhaps) preserve the training methods for the big toe dynamics and so should I get myself ASAP to Yoshinkan hombu, where an acquaintance of mine is a shidoin? This is the kind of thing I am looking for.